“As reliance on digital services continues to grow, so does the importance of data centers; they are critical to today’s modern economy,” DeWine said. “AWS’s substantial investment in Ohio will help keep our state at the forefront of the global technology.”
AWS plans to expand data centers outside Central Ohio but has not finalized locations, according to state officials.
In all, AWS plans to invest more than $23 billion between 2015 and 2030 in Ohio. The investment plans are contingent on long-term energy service agreements, the state said.
“Today, we reaffirm our long-term commitment to Ohio with plans to invest an additional $10 billion to expand our data center infrastructure in greater Ohio to drive innovation in AI for customers,” said Roger Wehner, vice president of economic development at AWS. “Since 2015, AWS has invested more than $10.3 billion in the state and currently supports more than 4,760 jobs annually.”
The company estimates it has contributed $3.8 billion in total gross domestic product to the state from 2015-2023. AWS’s investments support jobs in high-demand sectors including telecommunications, software development, facilities maintenance and electricity generation within the cloud infrastructure supply chain, the company says.
AWS last year announced a $7.8 billion investment in addition to more than $6 million already invested through 2022. Monday’s announcement of an additional $10 billion represents the second-largest planned investment — more than $23 billion — by a single private sector company in state history.
“These are significant investments from AWS that support Ohio’s growing reputation as the tech hub of the Midwest,” said Husted. “Artificial intelligence and data centers are crucial to America’s economic superiority because they drive innovation, support high-tech industries, enhance productivity across sectors and enable the analysis and management of vast data essential for global competitiveness.”
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